How to finish your first 42.195km in one piece

Given enough time, most of us can finish running/walking a full marathon.  However, for those who aren't sufficiently prepared physically and mentally, the whole journey can be a torture and the after effects of muscle soreness and 'jalan like ketam' will last for days. To avoid the unpleasant issues mentioned above there are a number of things one has do and prepare to finish a FM comfortably, in one piece and still being able to function normally after that.

First and foremost is of course enough training / running.  How much is enough? It depends on whether you are starting from scratch, or is already a 10k or 21k runner.  Whichever level that you are starting from to prepare for a FM, the most important training is what we call the LSD (Long Slow Day).  I have written an article about that earlier.  Click here to read.  An important factor to always bear in mind when building up distance over the weeks when doing the LSD is try not to exceed your weekly mileage by 10% (15% is the absolute limit) over your previous week.  This means, if this whole week you have done 30km in total, the following week you should do no more than 33km in total.  As and example, for a person who runs 3 times a week, Tuesday she runs 10km, Thursday another 10km, then LSD weekend 15km.  That's a total of 35km for that week.  So the following week, she does another 10km on Tuesday, 10km on Thursday, and the LSD weekend can be increased to 18.5km (Cause 35km x 10% is 3.5km).  This is to avoid overuse of your muscles and prevent injury.  Increase the LSD weekend at this rate and not faster.  Try to do LSD for as far as 32k just 3 weeks before your FM, thereafter you cut down to 16k LSD the following week, then 10k on the last week.  On the final week, in terms of running, just keep it light with less than 8k run per session.  Your final running session should just be a 15 minute slow run on the eve of the FM.

On top of building endurance, the LSD also lets you try out your real race strategy and various things you wanna try out before the real race.  These include the taking of water, electrolytes, energy gel, etc.  For me (this varies for everyone so you gotta try out your timing), I take a little bit of water every 3km because there is water station along the route of most good marathons at every 3km.  I take my first energy half an hour into my run, and one every 1 hour thereafter.  As for electrolytes, I take it at every other 3km after my 15km.

Next is food and drink. On the final week before your FM, there is the carbo loading week.  You should increase the amount of carbohydrates in your diet, like sphaghetti, and drink a lot of isonotic and water.  You can also include high potassium foods into your diet like banana, potatoes, squash, beans, to lessen the chance of cramps by balancing the electrolytes in your body.  This is also the week you will want to get a lot of sleep/rest so that your body can recharge faster. 

On the eve of race day, take a good meal no later than 10 hours before flag off, and avoid taking too much vegetables and high fibre food that may induce you to go to the toilet during your run.  High carbs food and meat are good choices.  On race day, wake up at least around 2 hours before flag off and have a light breakfast like oats, bread, buns, eggs and drink your usual coffee or beverage.  Most importantly, visit the toilet to you know what.  You won't wanna be holding that throughout your 42k run if it decides to come out then.

As for the run itself, just enjoy yourself and run at the pace which you have trained for.  You will definitely feel very energetic and feel like you can run a lot faster but never give in to the temptation of going faster.  Just run at the pace which you know you can and have trained for, and you will finish the whole 42.195km in one piece.

Above are the very minimalistic stuff to complete a full marathon fairly comfortably.  There are a lot more things one can do or use, like compression pants, tapes, salt sticks, bringing extra water for the run, etc.  Well, you can try all those out during your LSD, and see which are the ones you need and don't. 

If you still have questions or would like to know more, don't hesitate to drop me a message, will be glad to help.